THE DANGERS OF AUSCHWITZ

Causes of death

• Many people suffered from diseases due to poor conditions in the camp
• Winter was also a deadly factor, frostbites, pneumonia and colds occurred often
• Most people died from starvation sickness whose characteristics included diarrhea (often bloody), swollen legs, impaired vision and hearing, memory loss, nervous breakdown and, exhaustion to the point of collapse

VICTims

• Most of the people held captive in Auschwitz were Jewish (1,095,000)
• Other victims included Polish people (approx.74,000) Gypsies (21,000) Soviet prisoners of war (15,000)

AUSCHWITZ Divided

• Auschwitz I was the main camp which purpose was force labor
• Auschwitz II was the death center where the majority of deaths occurred
• Auschwitz III housed prisoners assigned to synthetic rubber works

Auschwitz Subcamps

• The SS authorities established 44 subcamps located in Upper Silesia
• These camps were used for agricultural processing for Auschwitz II
• Prisoners assigned to these subcamps were subordinate to Auschwitz III

Works cited

• https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/mobile/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005189
• http://auschwitz.org/en/history/camp-hospitals/sicknesses-and-epidemics/